Moscow, Apr 20 (UNI) Participants in the search and rescue operation pulled Russian cosmonauts Aleksey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner, as well as NASA astronaut Donald Pettit, from the descent module of the Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft, in which they returned from the International Space Station (ISS); the landing is being broadcast by Roscosmos.
After the evacuation, Ovchinin was given an Easter egg, which he immediately peeled and ate.
Late on Saturday evening, Ovchinin, Wagner and Pettit settled into the spacecraft, said goodbye to the remaining ISS crew of Russians Sergey Ryzhikov, Alexey Zubritsky and Kirill Peskov, Americans Anne McClain, Nicole Ayers and Johnny Kim, and Japanese Takuya Onishi, and then closed the hatches between the Soyuz and the ISS.
The spacecraft undocked from the station at 21:57 GMT on April 19. The spacecraft's engine was turned on for braking at 00:27 GMT.
After slowing down, Soyuz MS-26 left orbit, entered the dense layers of the atmosphere and separated into compartments. The broadcast footage showed it hovering over the Kazakh steppe on a parachute.
Ovchinin, Vagner and Pettit have been on the ISS since September 11, 2024.
During this time, the Russian cosmonauts have performed more than 40 experiments and conducted one spacewalk (in December), during which they installed the All Sky Monitor spectrometer outside the station.
UNI SPUTNIK ARN